Inspirational or a waste of precious slacking-off time? I once went on a buzzword bingo-laden training course which ended up with my being held at gunpoint in public. Could have gone better, to be honest. Tell us your tales from either side of the lectern

Not me but a former colleague.
As an equal opportunity employer my managment implemented a mandatory course on "Equality And Diversity In The Workplace".Now, the office that I was working in at the time was due to close so we were seriously short-staffed as people got moved to other postings. By short-staffed I mean that nearly everyone left was working 70 hour weeks as standard, good overtime when you're only rostered for 42 hours a week, but no real time off to enjoy it. The manager was on the forecasting bench full-time too, so he wasn't best pleased when he took a call from HR at our headquarters complaining that none of us had signed up for this course.HR: "Look, this course is mandatory, but not ONE member of your staff has come forward to sign up for it."Boss: "That'll be because none of the poor sods is getting more than one day off a week, how do you expect us to fill the roster here AND release staff for a 2 day talking-shop?"HR: "Well you're going to have to release SOMEONE to do it."Boss "Well, I suppose there is ONE person that I can release for two days."That one person was Steph, our Admin girl. Who happens to be black. Who then got the course co-ordinator a bollocking for her racist attitude. The event went something like this:Course Co-ordinator: "Now then, how would you like to be addressed? do you want me to call you Black British, British Of Afro-Caribean Heritage, British Ethnic, or something else?"Steph: "I'd like you to call me Steph actually, because that's my name. See, it's even on this stupid nametag that you made me wear. And the only people I've ever heard using the words British Ethnic are those BNP idiots, you're not one of their members are you?"This was what we were told after she got back a day early, and it earned her a standing ovation and a cake from the sandwich van that lunchtime.I miss Steph, she was good fun to work with.
(stuj(^(^;;^)^) GO TEAM SPIDERS!(^(^;;^)^), Sun 18 Mar 2012, 13:21,
closed)

She was LOVELY badge.
She quit when the weather centre closed because she didn't want to move to anywhere else.
(stuj(^(^;;^)^) GO TEAM SPIDERS!(^(^;;^)^), Sun 18 Mar 2012, 14:45,
closed)

Class
It's the truth really isn't it - most people couldn't give a fuck about race, colour, creed, religion et al. Yet there's still this lurking political correctness that insists on poking around in a bid to 'protect us all from discrimination'
(mr-lizardHell's teeth man!, Sun 18 Mar 2012, 16:44,
closed)

Surely these kind of courses are just the company admitting that thy may have employed racists?